Hello all,
I recently bought a wood/alu teardrop caravan in early summer and have recently discovered a fairly significant water ingress problem (revealed by the latterly dank conditions of the UK 'summer'). My intent is to repair and seal this issue, and am looking for some advice from the good folk of this learned forum as to how to achieve this please.
The issue is (presumably) ingress into the plywood walls of the caravan. This appears to be occurring in the exposed gap where the kitchen roof hinge shuts, and is travelling through the ply into the living area of van itself. The images below show the problem well:
1) Kitchen roof open showing the RHS seal where the roof meets the sidewall.
2) Close-up of the roof seal. To the right of the rubber seal is exposed plywood (painted black) with clear swelling of the ply underneath the varnished wooden cap. Being exposed, water is soaking into the ply, which is causing clear delamination (see photo 4).
3) Additional view of the swollen, delaminated ply.
4) Alternative view of the plywood wall of the caravan on the same side as the water ingress at the seal. You can see the deformation of the ply where it has delaminated down its length.
My intent is to make the delaminated ply good (epoxy resin is the current thinking) and then to seal the sides where the ingress is occurring (I'm not above taping at this point if it saves the side). Ideas as to how to achieve both of these aims, as well as any and all insight will be gratefully received with sincere thanks.
Chassis - steel trailer
Base - marine ply
Frame - aluminium
Slides - plywood painted in 2-pac paint
Thanks for taking the time to share in my problem.
-Fraser
I recently bought a wood/alu teardrop caravan in early summer and have recently discovered a fairly significant water ingress problem (revealed by the latterly dank conditions of the UK 'summer'). My intent is to repair and seal this issue, and am looking for some advice from the good folk of this learned forum as to how to achieve this please.
The issue is (presumably) ingress into the plywood walls of the caravan. This appears to be occurring in the exposed gap where the kitchen roof hinge shuts, and is travelling through the ply into the living area of van itself. The images below show the problem well:
1) Kitchen roof open showing the RHS seal where the roof meets the sidewall.
2) Close-up of the roof seal. To the right of the rubber seal is exposed plywood (painted black) with clear swelling of the ply underneath the varnished wooden cap. Being exposed, water is soaking into the ply, which is causing clear delamination (see photo 4).
3) Additional view of the swollen, delaminated ply.
4) Alternative view of the plywood wall of the caravan on the same side as the water ingress at the seal. You can see the deformation of the ply where it has delaminated down its length.
My intent is to make the delaminated ply good (epoxy resin is the current thinking) and then to seal the sides where the ingress is occurring (I'm not above taping at this point if it saves the side). Ideas as to how to achieve both of these aims, as well as any and all insight will be gratefully received with sincere thanks.
Chassis - steel trailer
Base - marine ply
Frame - aluminium
Slides - plywood painted in 2-pac paint
Thanks for taking the time to share in my problem.
-Fraser
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